Updates: news releases and updates

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Environmental leaders hosted a press call today to call for a State Department Investigator General investigation of the State Department’s flawed Keystone XL review process and to call on Secretary Kerry to halt the review process until that investigation is complete.

The Sierra Club also announced that it had filed a lawsuit in federal court yesterday under the Freedom of Information Act asserting that the U.S. Department of State is withholding key documents related to the latest Keystone XL EIS and potential conflicts of interest with ERM.

When Secretary Kerry was confirmed as Secretary of State, he inherited a flawed Keystone XL review process. To move forward with the flawed process would contradict Secretary Kerry’s long history as a proponent of good government and transparency.

“For decades John Kerry has been a strong defender of good governance,” said 350.org Executive Director May Boeve. “We know that as he learns more about how the Keystone environmental analysis was written, he will step in put a stop to this corrupted process.”

Nearly 73,000 people signed petitions asking Secretary Kerry to postpone the Final Environmental Impact Statement until the Investigator General completes a thorough review of conflict of interest in the State Department's environmental review process of the proposed pipeline. Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, Oil Change International, and Bold Nebraska all contributed signatures to the petition total.

“For the State Department to let Big Oil consultants tell us Keystone XL is safe is like the Surgeon General letting Big Tobacco tell us cigarettes are safe,” said Robin Mann, Past President of the Sierra Club. “Secretary Kerry can continue to live up to his legacy as a climate champion by demanding a fair report on Keystone XL and urging the President to reject this dirty and dangerous project.”

“The State Department should be an honest broker on Keystone XL, not a cheerleader for TransCanada,” said Erich Pica, Friends of the Earth President. “Secretary Kerry needs to halt the review process and find out how a paid member of the American Petroleum Institute was allowed to write such a critical report and why State Department employees have tried to cover up this company’s ties with the oil industry."

“The only way the State Department could produce even a remotely favorable review of this dirty and flawed pipeline is by getting Big Oil's friends to write it for them,” said Steve Kretzmann, Oil Change International Executive Director and Founder. "The tens of thousands of people who have joined this campaign are making it clear that we won't stand for this. Secretary Kerry has a key opportunity to reject bad process, to reject Big Oil influence, and to reject this dirty pipeline.”

Environmental Resources Management, the company contracted by Department of State and paid by TransCanada to draft the Environmental Impact Statement, is a member of the American Petroleum Institute and has worked for the oil industry which should have precluded it from getting hired.

“The United States must help lead the world in combating global warming and reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). “It would be incomprehensible to give approval to a tar sands oil project when producing tar sands oil creates more carbon emissions than conventional oil, and when it poses the risk of extremely damaging oil spills.”